Listening to Departments II
Campus Community:
I am delighted to announce the planning for Listening to Departments II.
This listening exercise will take place between mid-February and late March and
will consist of meetings with each department on campus. Vice Provost Carl Reiber,
Vice Provost Gregory Brown, and I will conduct the listening exercise, which will be
open to faculty in each department. Whereas last year’s process was focused on
strategic visions in the departments, this year will be dedicated to hearing your
vision for improving your departments. In preparation for that process we are
asking each department to prepare a short document and to consider a list of
questions that might structure our discussion.
Please follow the structure of last year’s Listening to Departments exercise;
each chair should identify a 1-3 person committee to convene a department-wide
meeting and collect information necessary to draft the document we seek. The draft
then should be presented to the department faculty for review and approval before
being sent to my office, to the attention of my Executive Assistant, Sandra Gajkowski
(Sandra.gajkowski@unlv.edu, ext. 5-4952). Departments are encouraged to take a
flexible approach to collecting information and producing the document but should
ensure that the document reflects, to the greatest extent possible, the consensus
view of the faculty in the department.
The Document
As the campus “reboots” and seeks to chart a path to excellence, it is crucial
that the Provost’s office understands the aspirations and goals of each department,
how each department envisions moving to reach these goals, and how the
department compares with the best programs in its discipline. We also need to
know how individual departments might improve their reputation,
scholarly/research productivity, and standing in their field. To get at these issues
please answer the following questions.
1. Identify any ratings or rankings in your field, the key factors that drive each
rating/ranking, and where your program falls in the ratings/rankings. It
would be most helpful if you would make specific comparisons with
programs at other schools in the ratings/rankings you identify.
2. Describe how your program can improve (both generally and in the
ratings/rankings noted) under the following scenarios. Please be specific
how you would deploy resources to improve the department in each
scenario, over the next 5 years.
a. With current faculty resources, assuming that any current faculty who
resign are replaced;
b. With the addition of 2 tenure track/tenured faculty lines in addition to
the current faculty.
c. With the addition of 4 tenure track/tenured faculty lines, in addition
to the current faculty.
d. With the addition of 8 tenure track/tenured faculty lines, in addition
to the current faculty.1
3. At each of the levels above, what would be the focus of the department?
Please express as degree programs and research areas.
Questions for our discussion
The purpose of listening to departments is to hear what concerns you most;
those concerns will drive our discussion. My office will schedule a department-wide
meeting for this purpose. Any of the following questions would constitute valuable
subjects for discussion, in addition to topics you want to raise. We will ask the first
question listed below to start the meeting.
1. Describe how your department collaborated in forming responses to the
document requested in this exercise.
2. Where relevant, please report on the effect of the support provided by the
President after last year’s listening exercise.
3. What are the key achievements of your department over the last five years?
4. What are the key current initiatives currently being pursued by your
department? How are they related to improving the department, its
scholarly/research profile, its teaching effectiveness, or its reputation?
5. What are the major challenges facing the department?
6. Describe any cross-disciplinary/collaborative initiatives undertaken with
other departments at UNLV or with other higher education institutions and
relate the benefits of those efforts.
7. Describe any impediments to faculty research success/productivity and offer
suggestions for eliminating them.
8. Describe any impediments to teaching and research collaboration on campus
and across the academy.
9. How can we help improve mentoring and faculty development within your
department?
10. How can we better help you engage community partnerships that relate to
and might improve the research and scholarship of department members?
For larger departments, please complete the report based on 0, 4, 8, and 16,
additional tenure track/tenured faculty lines.
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